42 INDIAN TRIBES. [Chap. I. 



kindles into a burning passion ; and to allay its 

 cravings, he will dare cold and famine, fire, tempest, 

 torture, and death itself. 



These generous traits are overcast by much that 

 is dark, cold, and sinister, by sleepless distrust, and 

 rankling jealousy. Treacherous himself, he is al- 

 ways suspicious of treachery in others. Brave as 

 he is, — and few of mankind are braver, — he will 

 vent his passion by a secret stab rather than an 

 open blow. His warfare is full of ambuscade and 

 stratagem; and he never rushes into battle with 

 that joyous self-abandonment, with which the war- 

 riors of the Gothic races flung themselves into the 

 ranks of their enemies. In his feasts and his drink- 

 ing bouts we find none of that robust and full-toned 

 mirth, which reigned at the rude carousals of our 

 barbaric ancestry. He is never jovial in his cups, 

 and maudlin sorrow or maniacal rage is the sole 

 result of his potations. 



Over all emotion he throws the veil of an iron 

 self-control, originating in a peculiar form of pride, 

 and fostered by rigorous discipline from childhood 

 upward. He is trained to conceal passion, and not 

 to subdue it. The inscrutable warrior is aptly im- 

 aged by the hackneyed figure of a volcano covered 

 with snow ; and no man can say when or where the 

 wild-fire will burst forth. This shallow self-mastery 

 serves to give dignity to public deliberation, and 

 harmony to social life. Wrangling and quarrel are 

 strangers to an Indian dwelling ; and while an as- 

 sembly of the ancient Gauls was garrulous as a 

 convocation of magpies, a Eoman senate might have 



